One Little Word

A couple of years ago, the church we attended urged us to prayerfully consider a word for the year. I felt that my word for 2015 was going to be "savor". I didn't know what that meant in the midst of our adoption process but after feeling confirmation, I went with it.

That year God took me through savoring the lessons He was teaching me in humility through fundraising our adoption. I learned to savor our little family of 3 girls while we waiting for our little emperor. I savored our time in China even though it wasn't easy. I savored the six months I had with our new family of 6 while I waiting for my deployment to start. All year long, I savored the sweetness of God as He walked us down difficult paths I didn't expect.

As 2016, was about to start, I again asked Him for my word and got the word, "peace". I wrestled with Him over it as I was literally days from leaving my family to go to war. How could "peace" be my word? As the year went on though, I saw His peace surpassing all my understanding as I left my family and served my 6 month commitment on the other side of the world. I felt His peace when things didn't make sense, when I worshiped, and when I asked questions and didn't always like the answer.

Now we are on the edge of 2017 and I've asked again and He's again given me a word I never would have expected.

Abandon.

As an adoptive mom, that's not a word I love. He quickly took me to the definitions as both a noun and a verb and I am already seeing His will in this little word.

Abandon: to give up control of, complete surrender, yield oneself

Already, I feel him calling me to:

...abandon constantly checking my phone and be more present with my family
...abandon my plans for the year
...abandon my expectations of my friends and family and embrace what I do have

and also
...worship Him with complete abandon

I hope that members of our family will be going to China this year to visit orphans. I'm planning on a busy year for our family and our business. But I'm learning to abandon those expectations and make Him Lord of my calendar.

What's your one little word?

10 Ways Churches Can Support Adoption and Foster Care

Let me first start this one with some background about how God feels about orphans:

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. James 1:27


Here is how God sees adoption:

To redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God. Galatians 4:5-7

I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. John 14:18

And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. Romans 8:23

For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” Romans 8:15

For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in. Psalm 27:10

He literally uses it over and over to compare our new relationship with Him when we accept His free gift of salvation. I believe abandonment is injustice and God wants us to act. My husband and I adopted Liam not because we are his rescuers but because of the love God has put in our heart. I believe Jesus wants us to go after and love the hurting, abandoned and those that the world would see as "the least of these". There are millions of orphans in this world and I believe the Church should and could be doing more. It would change the lives of these children and it shows the world what the gospel really is. 

My thoughts on this started because of a Facebook post on one of my adoption pages I follow. The person posting asked what churches could do to better help adopting/fostering families because they had a family leave their church over lack of support. The responses were mixed. Some families experienced a very supportive environment from their church, but sadly many were either silent or even intentionally hurtful.

I mentioned this post on Twitter and had someone who is going to school to become a pastor asked me what churches should be doing. I'm not on staff at a church, I'm just an adoptive mom but I will throw some ideas from my perspective. So here are a list of 10 things churches could be doing to support orphan care and fostering/adopting families.

1. Educate Yourselves and Your Staff
I have been shocked by how little the average Christian knows about the orphan and foster care crisis around the world. Find out how many children are in foster care in your area and which countries are currently allowing international adoption. Find out what happens to kids that age out without ever having a family. Educate yourself about the costs of all of these options to families. I have people ask me often how much it costs to adopt from China. I always start by asking them, "How much do you think it costs?" So far nobody has come close to guessing. The average answer is half of the actual cost. To learn more I would start with the Christian Alliance for Orphans. 

2. Celebrate Orphan Sunday
Orphan Sunday is one day a year where your church can highlight the cause of orphans around the world. It is in November and an amazing opportunity to share the chance to give and pray for the fatherless. Maybe your church could fund a specific project for an orphanage in a country your church already supports. Maybe you could share adoption information or highlight families in your congregation that have or are adopting. However you choose to celebrate, it is a way of focusing on God's heart for those children in need.

3. Assign a Staff Member 
One of the most helpful ways to help families in adoption or fostering process is to assign a pastor to care for them. Many applications to adopt or for adoption funding grants require a letter from a pastor and with many families (like ours) attending a very large church, it can be difficult for those families to know what to do. Make it clear to the congregation that if a family is entering this process, they can see Pastor Smith. Then Pastor Smith can meet with them, pray with them and they would feel connected to someone who can write them a letter of recommendation. 

4. Mission Trips
Several translations of James 1:27 actually use the phrase "visit orphans and widows in their distress". I believe that part of a church's mission plan for the year should include visiting orphans and widows. That can be done through organizations that churches are already working with or partnering with an adoption agency and providing people and resources for orphanage visit trips. Our agency goes on several trips to different countries throughout the year. These trips are so crucial because the people who go are able to get information about these children and advocate for them. It can be a wonderful blessing to the children and often the teams' lives are changed by the experience.

5. Bring Them Meals
If your church organizes bringing new moms or those recovering from illness/surgery meals, please do the same for adopting families. I've given birth to 3 biological children and the lack of sleep from jet lag and adjustment from adoption is just as intense if not more so.  Those first few weeks of bringing home a new child are a huge adjustment and something as simple as a fellow church member bringing a meal can mean the world. Treat this child the way you would any other new baby brought into the church.

6. Baby Dedication/Baptism
Please remember to add adoption language when you are posting about upcoming dedication/baptism events. This can be very subtle but acknowledge that not every dedication will be of a biological newborn.

7. Connect families
You can connect families though quiet personal ways of introducing them to each other or having an adoption/foster group through your church. Either way, this can go far to help families not feel so alone and get the support through the process that they desperately need.

8. Educate Your Children's Team
A child brought into your church through foster care or adoption will probably have different needs than children coming with their biological parents. One of the best and simplest ways to ease that child's transition is to ask their parent what your team can do to help. In our case, no one knew that our son was adopted and he was snapped at by a volunteer that didn't understand that he didn't speak English. Some families are working very hard on forming attachment with their new child and would rather they be the one to feed or rock their child to sleep so they need to know during service if that needs to happen. Many of these kids will have experienced trauma or have physical special needs, so it would be great if extra volunteers or volunteers with extra training could be present to help.

9. Meet Their Needs
I understand that churches cannot say yes to every need but anything would be a blessing to those adopting and fostering. Some churches give financial grants while others allow their members to host bake sales, rummage sales, or pancake breakfasts at their facility. Some churches also support these families by promoting their fundraising events. Most families in this country do not have the $30-40,000 it takes to complete an international adoption. Most families would be strained if they had to immediately buy all they needed to take on a foster child/children (carseats, crib, etc.). Anything you can do to help these families with their practical needs is very appreciated. 

10. Pray
This is the most important thing you can ever do. Pray for orphans. Pray for families. 

If just ONE family in every THREE churches in America adopted a waiting child, there would be no waiting children in foster care. International adoption is down over 60% in the last decade. We can do better as the body of Christ to care for the fatherless.

But don't take it just from me:

Backwards but brave

Today was Liam's cardiology check up. There were no great surprises but it is always just a heavy reminder that we parent a child with a very serious heart defect. It is so easy to forget most days when he is running around the house or riding his bike that his heart has a string of diagnoses: ASD, VSD, CCTGA and a host of associated valve issues.

Our cardiologist said that she always has to pay special attention to looking at his echocardiograms because everything is backwards and I compared it to when I, as a meteorologist, have to do weather in the Southern Hemisphere. Nothing looks how you expect it to.

Not much has changed since his last appointment late last year. One of his valves has gone from having a mild issue to have a mild-moderate issue so we will keep an eye on it. Many kids with Liam's condition have already had at least one surgery and some have pacemakers. For now, we will just be thankful he's made it thus far without major intervention.

Our cardiologist did suggest getting a second opinion at Texas Children's Hospital so we will probably do that in the next year. She said that there are no easy answers with CCTGA patients because we either risk 2 complex heart surgeries with risks of complications now or we wait and most likely he will end up with a heart transplant. The advantage of waiting is that medical technology continues to improve and there may be a better option with lower risks down the road.

I'm sure we can manage to combine a hospital trip with some fun memories in Houston and Galveston so we will start planning. I'm thankful we have such great doctors and hospitals in this state.

And for now, we keep waiting and praying he stays healthy and active and remembering this:

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.
Proverbs 3:5

The Dangerous Song

We sang a song this Sunday at church that could change a person's life, but only if they mean it.

Whatever You want
Whatever You ask
Our lives are Yours
We gladly lay them in Your hands

I stopped a second during the chorus thinking about the weight of these words because they are very dangerous. I prayed them over 2 years ago and God has called me to things I never dreamed possible. I wouldn't take back a moment of it but if you desire things like "comfort", "normal", "predictable", then this isn't the prayer for you. But it comes with the package of making Him Lord of your life. 

In the last 2 years, I've visited Chinese orphanages, adopted a 7 year old and been deployed to the Middle East for 6 months. I've climbed the Great Wall twice, watched people be baptized under the Arabian sky, eaten at Subway in Kuwait, sushi in Tokyo and completed a half marathon in the middle of the night. 

It has been an exhausting season and the ambitious person inside me is ready to slay more dragons. Sometimes though, when you pray the dangerous prayer and sing the dangerous song, He says something very different. Right now, the Voice of Heaven has been saying, "Rest and wait."

In some ways this is the hardest thing He could ask of me because it doesn't feel right and I don't know how long it will last. I could see the size of the 'adoption mountain' or the length of the 'deployment desert' but I don't know how long this rest in the valley will be. My husband and I even went to a membership class at church and when we went to check the box to say we were joining the church, neither of us could do it. We want to adopt again but don't feel this is the right time. 

The other night we were invited over to have dinner with a family about to adopt a boy from Korea who wanted to hear about our experience bringing Liam home. We had a beautiful night sharing our joys and struggles and hearing their beautiful hearts. That night I asked God for other chances to share the beauty of adoption and I heard Him whisper, "Be faithful with the audience I've already given you." To me, this means for now, I will keep blogging and sharing on social media and trust Him with the rest.

And for our family's next steps, we will keep praying and singing. We will savor every moment of just being whole as a family again. We will celebrate all that He is brought us through. We will breathe in the peace of this moment.

What's your why?

A few months ago, I was sitting in this service at Gateway:

And it hasn't gotten out of my head since. I wanted to know my why. I'm 37 years old and I need to know my why. So I asked God what my why was and He faithfully kept showing me and I resisted. I don't know exactly the reason why I pushed back but I guess I never expected this. You see, I don't like kids that much. I love my kids but I always used to say how I really don't LOVE other people's kids. I used to work in the pre-K class at church and I did not love it. I did it because I felt like I should. Then I got to China and worked in Liam's orphanage. I came home and told my husband how confused I was because I don't like other people's kids but I loved every moment with them. And then he said, "But those weren't other people's kids. Those were nobody's kids."

That's my why: nobody's kids.

I've learned more about the gospel in the last 2 years than I have in my whole life sitting in a church. I learned how passionately God loved me and sought after me while I was far off and had no idea what he was doing. I thought to myself the other day how I would have spent every dollar I had ever made in my life to get my son home and I heard God's voice say, "I know you would. And I did. I paid it all for you."

I'm still figuring out the what but I know the why. I saw this quote from Francis Chan the other day:

"Our greatest fear should not be of failure but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter."

In one beautiful moment, I realized I'm not afraid of that. Because if I spend my whole life setting the lonely in families, redeeming the atrocity of abandonment and just loving the least of these, it will be a life well spent.

Even in the why

I think most people who are friends with me on Facebook and Instagram would see the adorable pictures of my kids and think this has been just a blissful joy-filled year. That's the problem with social media. I'm not going to post the countless moments that have made this one of the most difficult, heartbreaking years of my life. Don't get me wrong, Liam has been a huge blessing. My kids are wonderful. But our family has gone through unbelievable pain this year and it isn't over yet. I would have never dreamed possible some of the disappointments we have endured. These are just heartbreaks we can't share on social media for a variety of reasons. There have been things we have prayed for that we have watched slip through our hands like sand. I remember Priscilla Shirer say in a conference over 15 years ago, "Hold onto everything loosely, so it won't hurt so much when it is pulled out of your hands." Well, I guess I didn't listen because it has hurt.


Part of why it has hurt is that I've messed up where my joy should come from. Psalm 30:5 says, "Weeping may last through the night, but joy comes with the morning." I have let my prayer request be my hope of having joy and not the Lord. God speaks to me most clearly through music and this song helped me see this. 

Even in the why, 
in the middle of the night I say 
You are good
Though my prayers are heard, 
the response is Yours God 
You are good
Sorrow may last the whole night, 
joy comes in the morning light
You are faithful 
God You are faithful, 
You have never left my side


I was waiting for the phone call of good news like it was my morning light. But then comes the bridge:

You are the sunrise 
You are the sunrise, 
there is no mistaking Your light

He is my sunrise. There is no mistaking His light because even if I had gotten everything we had prayed for this year, it wouldn't last forever like He will. The earthly, temporal good news I had been praying for is not the eternally faithful good news. 

So what do we do? We keep going. We fix our eyes and worship even in the why. We trust that He's holding us through this and He still has a plan. 
He is faithful and good.

Thank you Rita Springer for your beautiful song (Gateway Worship)

Standing on her shoulders

"If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants."
Isaac Newton

Yesterday, I attended the memorial service of an incredible woman. I met her at the age of three when she became my Sunday School teacher. For most Sunday School teachers, the story would stop right there. I'm sure she gave us juice and animal crackers, showed us a story on a flannel board and sang Father Abraham to keep us occupied until our parents came to retrieve us. 

But it didn't end there. When it was time for the girls from that class to move on to the 4 year old class, she wasn't ready to let us go. She was a single mom with one son and she always dreamed of having a daughter. So we became her girls for a few nights each year when she would have us over for slumber parties.  We grew up and some of us even moved on to other churches but for many years we still gathered together to play beauty shop, eat pizza, watch silly movies and feel loved by our Miss Suzie. 

I found out yesterday that she worked extra jobs to make those parties special for us. I also found out that almost until her death, she volunteered at an elementary school.  A mom from the school shared that Miss Suzie started each year making handmade Valentines in September so that by February, all 800 children in that school would at least have one little paper reminder that they were loved. For some of them, maybe it was the only time each year they saw those words. Person after person shared stories of how she showed God's love by her humor and compassion.

We live in a world where everyone complains that they don't have enough time. We are limited by a finite number of days and there are a lot of responsibilities on each of our plates that drain our time away.  But we all have a choice with what we do with the days we are given. Are we loving with every chance we get? Are we investing in kids? Are we serving the world around us the way Jesus is calling all of us to? 

I'm going to be spending some time in prayer asking God how I can honor Miss Suzie's memory and carry on her work of loving others.  She was one of those giants in the faith whose very presence declared the name of Jesus. We should all press on to leave such a legacy of love.

This was the last verse she posted on Facebook.  May we all be able to say the same.

Whom have I in heaven but you?
    And earth has nothing I desire besides you.
 My flesh and my heart may fail,
    but God is the strength of my heart
    and my portion forever.

 Those who are far from you will perish;
    you destroy all who are unfaithful to you.
 But as for me, it is good to be near God.
    I have made the Sovereign Lord my refuge;
    I will tell of all your deeds.

Psalm 73:25-28

Kids from here...and kids from there.

There was a beautiful news story this week about a group of Chinese kids coming to Houston for a hosting program. Hosting orphans is an amazing way to let them experience another culture while people can meet them and hopefully begin the process of adopting them.  That should be the end of the story but it wasn't. Unfortunately, I read the comments. We have an ongoing joke on Twitter about never reading the comments but sometimes you just can't help it.  I knew what people were going to say but the frequency of people saying the same predictable thing was just mindblowing.

Here's the basic gist of many of the Facebook comments:
"That's great and all but why don't people adopt from America first when we have so many kids that need families"

I have actually had people say this to me so let me address this.  Most of these people are Christians so let me translate what I hear when someone says this.

"Why don't we pull every missionary out of the mission field because we have unsaved people here in America?"
"Why don't we stop sending food to other countries because we have starving people here in America?"
"Why don't we keep doctors from serving overseas because we have sick people here in America?"

So let me answer that from my perspective:

We go into all the world because that is where Jesus sent us.

I really could stop right there but you know I won't.

Jesus didn't draw the border around America and say "Hey ya'll, take care of your problems right around you first and then maybe worry about them foreigners."

I promise He didn't say that. I've checked.  He actually cleared this up in the story about the Good Samaritan.  He told a man how to attain eternal life (by loving God and his neighbor) and then went on to tell the story about how a Samaritan man (foreigner) took care of someone who couldn't take care of himself. He said that the Samaritan was the injured man's true neighbor.

So why are some people called to minister on the streets of Kansas City and others on the streets of Indonesia?  Because that's where God called them.
Why are some people practicing medicine in Cleveland and some people doing the same in Angola? Because that's where God called them or where they choose to work.
Why are some people fostering and adopting kids from their town and others adopting kids from the other side of the world. Because that's where God called them or they feel like that process is best for their family.

The foster/adoption process is very different domestically and internationally.  I went to a local adoption and fostering support group last night and every single family's story was completely different. The tie that bound all of us together was that we were all loving children that we did not give birth to and it was beautiful and broken.  It was filled with deep pain and great joy.

Let me clear up a few things though that many people just do not know. Of all the kids in foster care, only about 1/4 of them are available for adoption. That is because many of them are waiting for their parents or another family member to regain their ability to care for them.  From what I have seen, our system is set up to keep kids with their biological family.  That is not usually possible internationally.  We do not know who the biological parents are in most of the cases in countries like China and if they came forward, they would most likely be punished greatly for abandoning their child.

Domestically, of those that are available, many are older or a part of a sibling group and not every family is able to take in multiple children or teenagers. But kids are being adopted from foster care. I personally know many families who have done just that. It happens every day. If every person who commented on that Facebook page entered the world of domestic adoption and fostering, we would have far less of a problem. If just one of every 500 Americans actually adopted who said they had considered it, every child in this country would have a home.

There are also many people hoping to adopt a newborn in our country.  Here is the nine page list of them just from one agency in our area. There was a single woman in our group last night that has been waiting for 2 years for a baby to adopt.  There are loving families praying for a baby to fill a place in their home.

I pray that more people do answer the call to adopt and foster domestically.  I also pray that more people answer the call to adopt internationally.  God loves the little children of the world and they all need a family.  He loves the kids from here...and the kids from there.

Butterflying

The one thing that I do not want to do with this blog is act like our experience is every adoption experience. Every child, family, and experience is different. This is just our story. I believe that you get a beautiful tapestry by reading lots of adoption stories. I'm a member of 2 local adoption groups and I have already seen how different each story is and I love hearing God work in each of them.

I have read the suggested books and taking the online training required from my agency. Much of it was very interesting and enlightening but I believe the parenting my husband and I already did with our biological children wasn't much different than they suggested. We don't spank. We do "time-ins" with younger children so they can rethink their behavior within a few feet of us. We follow 1-2-3 Magic from Dr. Phelen and there really isn't yelling in our home. We co-sleep during naps and currently my 4 year old is laying on my back resting because she's tired from swimming. I'm a stay at home mom and my husband works from home so we spend as much time as possible together and our house is full of snuggles and family fun.

One thing that is pretty prevalent in the adoption community is the idea of cocooning. It is forming attachment with your child through staying close to home and limiting outside influences for weeks or months after you bring your child home. I think it can be a beautiful way to bond for most families.  So far though, that isn't what we have done. Liam was ready to leave the orphanage and have a family. His nannies told us that he was asking when his family was coming for months before we arrived. He is an active 7 year old boy that will be starting 1st grade next month in a public school and he hasn't shown a single sign of not being attached to us.  He wants us to hold him, snuggle, hold our hand and he doesn't look to any other adult for affection or attention. He loves going out every day and on the days we do stay at home and just play with playdoh or build legos, he seems bored. If I even slightly indicate we might be going somewhere, he's putting on his shoes and shouting, "car!"

Basically, if I saw a single sign that Liam wasn't attaching to us or couldn't handle our Summer schedule of play dates, splash parks, and vacation Bible school, we would stop immediately and slow everything way down. But he seems to love it and is just happy settling into what we normally do as a family. So I'm listening to all of you other adoptive moms out there. I'm listening to the experts as well. But first and foremost, I'm listening to my kid. And he's saying (in the cutest accent), "Let us go!!!"

Getting to know him

So it has been over a week that Liam has been an official Stevenson. International adoption is a crazy process because it combines adding a member to your family with going on a stressful vacation.  We spent 3 days in Beijing sightseeing, then a week in Liam's province, then almost another week in Guangzhou where the U.S. Consulate is.  You are crammed in hotels, shuttled through airports and train stations surrounded by a language you don't understand and you days are filled with new experiences.  In the midst of all of this, you are trying to get to know a special needs child and help them understand you are their new parents.

I know, I'm probably selling it well.  There are actually a wide variety of experiences. Some are very difficult. Our son's province was a larger city with lots to see and do in a few days. People from around the world choose to visit Xi'an because of its historical significance. We had Subway, Pizza Hut and KFC mixed in with all the Chinese food.  Our hotel was larger and the breakfast buffet had some western options. Some families go to provinces with harsher weather, not much to see or do and no American food. Some families have children with very significant needs or that go through significant grieving as they transition to their adoptive families. We have been incredibly blessed so far that Liam has had the energy to go on sightseeing trips and hasn't shown us much in the way of grieving.

He is a sharp little guy. He knows a few letters of the alphabet, numbers 1-10, colors, shapes, is amazing at puzzles and I feel he is on track with some help to have a good year in 1st grade. As for his heart, we will have to wait and see what doctors say.  He is a well behaved little boy but behaviorally like a 4-5 year old.  We are working on him not touching everything in a store and not having to touch the face of every kid in our group. He hasn't had a ton of boundaries because in an orphanage, there wasn't much he couldn't touch.  We are working on that but mostly we are just playing with him, wrestling, tickling, and learning all about him.

There have been families here who have had a much harder time and I ask that we all continue to pray for them. People have said that Liam (and all these kids) are so lucky.  I know that those who say that mean well but they aren't lucky.  They were born with a major physical disability that led to them being abandoned by parents who most likely loved them deeply but could not afford to keep them. Many of them (some go to foster families) were raised in an institution where they never knew the love of a family. They never had anyone to call "Mama" or "Baba".  Many of them had surgeries and laid in hospital beds alone with no parents to hold their hand or pray over them.  Then kids like Liam watched their friends one by one get adopted and leave while they waited.  Now, he leaves the country, language, culture and everything he knows for the great unknown of life with us in America. Yes, now Liam is blessed that he was chosen off the waiting child list and he has a family but it was not a lucky road to get here.

So we are taking home an amazing little boy.  But we are leaving so many behind.  I pray every night that all of them find a home.  This process wasn't easy but I don't want to live in a world where I have seen orphans and done nothing. Will we do this again? Hopefully.  I know we will keep advocating and helping others adopt. In the meantime, we will be loving this little guy as best we can.

Here are more pictures from our trip.

Nothing is Wasted

We are a family of nerds and I'm okay with that. As a family, we are watching Star Trek: The Next Generation from beginning to end on Netflix. Most of our Saturday nights, after the kids go to bed, are spent watching Doctor Who.  I think we watched the new Star Wars trailer at least 5 times the day it came out.  And yes, we aren't just sci-fi fans, I'm the dork who took 5 math and science credits in high school instead of getting early release because Genetics and Statistics sounded fun.  I spent my weekends in college chasing storms or doing extra weather modules on laser discs.  My daughter is attending her first Comic Con this weekend and I see cosplay in her future.

All that to say, an episode of Star Trek TNG really caught our attention the other day.  Geordi ends up saving a planet where humans live in a biosphere trying to genetically engineer a perfect race.  He did it using the technology from his visor. He even tells the scientist from the planet he's working with that if it were up to them, he never would have been born because of his disability. He almost laughs at the irony that very disability is saving them. She has a revelation that they are actually behind in technology because there is no struggle with perfectly engineered people. Basically, if necessity is the mother of invention, their perfect race didn't need for much and didn't create much.

Sadly, our culture in the 21st century doesn't look that much different than these biosphere people. We have aborted 90% or more of those diagnosed with Down Syndrome in the womb.  Some parents select the perfect embryos and discard the rest even based on gender. But in the search for perfection, we miss the wondrous struggle.

Yesterday, I stepped foot in a new world.  It is a world of evaluations, forms, therapists and IEPs. It was a Special Education building. My youngest, like her father and to a small degree her older sister, has a condition called disfluency.  Basically, she stutters. It looks like she will be starting speech therapy when she starts kindergarten in the Fall.  And instead of sadness, I choose joy.  I look to the glory that God will reveal through this.  If it hadn't been for my husband's speech disorder, I don't know who he would be. It made him into an incredible listener and someone who thinks carefully about his words before he speaks. And he fell in love with me partly because I let him finish his sentences when others didn't.

My dad is almost completely deaf.  I can see on his life how what seemed like a disability has turned into a testimony.  Liam has a congenital heart defect. I'm learning more about it every day. He may need surgery soon or someday far in the future.  I know that God has a plan through it either way. What looks like a life threatening condition, will be his story and song.

God uses all of it for His glory.  It is all part of His plan.  Not a single pain, disease or diagnosis is wasted in His kingdom.


he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

Counting the Cost

As we wait for our travel to China, I can't help but look back at this journey so far and one of the biggest miracles has been God's financial provision.  I believe that our family being very transparent in this process will encourage others to begin the journey of giving another child a home so here's what the numbers look like:

I believe that this adoption will end up totaling about $37K.  Again, if you want to see where that money goes, please check out the cost page on our adoption agency's website. The bulk of it is about to be paid out in plane tickets, our in-country travel package and the orphanage donation we give in China.  A lot of it pays for our agency to manage the program and to cover background checks, visas and other government requirements.  I'm so thankful that from the very beginning they were open about the costs.

About half of the costs we were able to come up with from our budget.  Every tax refund, third paycheck or any dollar we could squeeze from our budget went straight into the "adoption" fund in our budget spreadsheet.  Literally, if our gas bill was $7 less than we were expecting, that $7 was transferred over.  Some months we did better than others but God multiplied when it looked impossible.  We never could have embarked on adopting Liam unless we had gone through Financial Peace University, paid off $39k in 18 months and gotten to "Baby Step 3".  We had already trimmed our personal budget down to pay off that amount of debt and kept a monthly budget where we know where every dollar is going before the month begins.  We basically stayed in "gazelle intensity mode" for this entire process.

I believe about half of the cost came from fundraising and generous donations.  We raised over $13k on our AdoptTogether page.  Over $5000 more came from our pancake breakfast, garage sales, craft sales, t-shirt sales, and individual donations.  We also received a grant from Sowing Roots that we have applied directly to our agency to cover our travel.  I am still so overwhelmed by the generosity of our friends, family and even complete strangers.  Thank you for being a part of Liam's story and blessing our family by your giving.  I have learned so much through this process and I definitely am inspired by your generous giving and want to give more to others.

I write all of this to encourage you.  Whether it is adoption, missions, starting a ministry, I believe that God has a call on all of our hearts.  Whatever that is, I believe that He will provide a path and the means to walk that path.  He is our great provider!

And God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. 
2 Cor 9:8

Almost there

I have updated our timeline blog about where we are in our adoption process and what future dates look like. We now have plane tickets purchased and a vague itinerary of when we are going to China and how that trip will look.  We are waiting to pay for our in country travel package so that we can see how things are looking financially.

Right now though we are focusing on spending time as a family of 5 and thinking about packing for a 2 week trip to China.

People sometimes don't realize what a tremendous thing this is for Liam. He isn't winning the lottery. This isn't Little Orphan Annie. He's a real kid that has been well taken care of around friends and nannies who have loved him for the past 7 years.  He's about to leave all that he knows and have to learn a new family, culture and language.  Is it better for him in a family? Absolutely or we wouldn't be doing this.  Is it going to be easy? For him and for us, the answer is no.

We ask for you to understand if you don't see us around that much this Summer.  We will come home and be working on the hard battle of attachment and bonding.  We won't be attending church right away. We will be going to lots of doctors and trying to get him ready to start the 1st grade.  We love our friends and family and want you to meet him but the reality is that he needs to get used to just us first.  Hopefully, the transition will go well and we will be able to introduce him to our lives quickly but we just don't know what it is going to look like right now.

Many people have asked if he knows English or how our Mandarin is.  He does not speak any English that we know of.  We have been working on basic Mandarin phrases but we are not fluent.

And then the question comes, "How's that going to work?"

It is going to work through love.  We are going to do our best.  We are going to use technology and hand gestures.  We will figure it out and children learn quickly when fully immersed.

We need your prayers. We need peace.  We need safety for our trip.  We need Liam's physical and spiritual heart to stay strong.

Thank you to each one of you that is part of this story.  We will not be putting much publicly on social media during our trip so if you want to follow along, please follow our Facebook group.

My biggest regret

Each day gets us a little closer and today our Article 5 was picked up and now we wait for Travel Approval! We are praying it comes in the next few days and we can begin buying airfare and planning our trip.

I have the app "TimeHop" on my phone and I can look back over what I posted on social media over the last 5-6 years every day in a snapshot.  I keep seeing posts I made 5 years ago about all the changes that were going on in our life as I was pregnant with our youngest and moving from Missouri to Texas. As I watch each day of that journey come up on the app, I keep seeing the same thing over and over. I was constantly worried about things that never happened. I was worried we wouldn't sell our house and we did. I was worried our youngest at the time wouldn't do well with the move and she did.

The same is true over the last year of my life and I'm determined to stop.

I've been worried about so many things so far that haven't happened on this journey. I was worried we wouldn't be able to be matched with Liam and we were.  The paperwork seemed too big to overcome but we did it. I fretted that we would never be approved and of course we were. I spent days in agony afraid we wouldn't have the money and it looks like we have it thanks to all those who gave and God's grace.  I regret spending so much time worrying about all of these things that never were an issue.

So here we are waiting to travel and bring our son home. There are a million questions in my mind like about what is about to happen like:

How will we communicate with him?
Will he like our food?
Will he love us or even like us?
Will he be overcome with grief leaving everything he knows?
What is his medical diagnosis going to look like?

I'm determined to not let those worries and questions overwhelm me as we move forward. It may be hard. It may not look how we expect. But God has had this whole process in His hand from the beginning and I believe He did not bring us or Liam this far to leave us now.

I believe Psalm 27 has been the song of this adoption. Take a minute. Quiet your heart. Trust in Him.

You, LORD, are the light

that keeps me safe.

I am not afraid of anyone.

You protect me,

and I have no fears.

²Brutal people may attack

and try to kill me,

but they will stumble.

Fierce enemies may attack,

but they will fall.

³Armies may surround me,

but I won't be afraid;

war may break out,

but I will trust you.

⁴I ask only one thing, LORD:

Let me live in your house

every day of my life

to see how wonderful you are

and to pray in your temple.

⁵In times of trouble,

you will protect me.

You will hide me in your tent

and keep me safe

on top of a mighty rock.

⁶You will let me defeat

all of my enemies.

Then I will celebrate,

as I enter your tent

with animal sacrifices

and songs of praise.

⁷Please listen when I pray!

Have pity. Answer my prayer.

⁸My heart tells me to pray.

I am eager to see your face,

⁹so don't hide from me.

I am your servant,

and you have helped me.

Don't turn from me in anger.

You alone keep me safe.

Don't reject or desert me.

¹⁰Even if my father and mother

should desert me,

you will take care of me.

¹¹Teach me to follow, LORD,

and lead me on the right path

because of my enemies.

¹²Don't let them do to me

what they want.

People tell lies about me

and make terrible threats,

¹³but I know I will live

to see how kind you are.

¹⁴Trust the LORD!

Be brave and strong

and trust the LORD.